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| https://twitter.com/snowden |
We have all heard of Edward Snowden and how he single-handedly began the tumbling snowball of worrying about individual privacy. As Americans, we not only expect freedom, we celebrate it. That is what we are stereotypically known for: obnoxiously embracing our freedom. Not only was it controversial that an American would release sacred government intelligence, the information that was released put the entire government under a microscope. This event, along with many others, has caused the public to adopt sour feelings of distrust towards organizations like the NSA that we are supposed to entrust our lives with because the public is learning how much of their personal communications are being monitored without any consent or disclosure.
Edward Snowden, an ex-CIA agent downloaded around 1.5 million top-secret files belonging to the NSA and only released not even 1% of the information. About 7,000 files were released to journalists, which was almost immediately released to the public.
On June 6, 2013, according to Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai in a Mashable article, it was released that the NSA had collected the phone records millions of Verizon Wireless customers. Soon after this was released, it was discovered that it was not only Verizon that the secret court orders were getting phone records from but virtually every other phone company too. Along with that, every single call that occurs in the Bahamas and Afghanistan is intercepted and stored using a technology called MYSTIC. They are also able to store every single text message using a software called Dishwire. This made it extremely clear to the public that they couldn’t communicate with anyone without having the government being able to see their every move. Even if they don’t have anything to hide, no one should feel like someone is watching them at all times.
Another huge invasion of privacy that the US public felt was the discovery of a program called Stellar Wing which allowed the NSA to collect internet and email data of millions of Americans. The second piece of information that was released was the program entitled PRISM. This allowed the NSA to directly access servers of huge tech companies like Google, Yahoo, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, etc. Many citizens saw these tactics as an invasion of privacy and crossing the line.
Yes, it is the job of the NSA to protect us and our online safety, but being able to access virtually any information they wanted without disclosing their action to the public is crossing the line. Like I previously stated, no one should be worried about someone watching them when they are just sending an email with private health information to a family member. How are we supposed to feel safe when the people who are supposed to be ensuring our safety are invading our privacy?
Future Research Questions:
- What happened when the government tried to get Apple to release phone records following a terrorist attack?
- Are companies required to give up their rights during crucial times?
- Has the NSA changed their policies after their sensitive information was released to the public?
